Ace High Western Magazine, March 1941 — page 18: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

16 ACE-HIGH WESTERN STORIES Doc dropped his scalpel in the stream- ing pan. He hurried from the kitchen. A door opened, and the angry clamor came full-throated. “All right, you hoodlums!’’ Breaker’s shouted words got instant respect and a lull fell. ‘What’s the idea of a mass meet- ing in my front yard?” “Send that squatter out here!’ The voice, with its snarled east Texas vowels, brought Bill the picture of a slouching, loose-coupled man wearing low-slung for- ty-fives. Dode Benton shot trouble for Barney Sloane down at the Territory House. Texas white-trash, Frijole Flat called him. He wore a puncher’s rig, but _ the hardest work he’d ever done was to bury his drygulched dead. “There’s a girl in there maybe dying,” Doc rasped, “and you come howlin’ for a man to lynch!” “No damn’ Frijole Flatter’s going to kill a Kingbolt girl and live to brag on it!’’ Benton retorted. “Don’t try to stop us, Doc! We’re comin’ after him!” PURRED “boots clanked across the gallery. They dragged to an abrupt halt. Doc’s voice had a wicked snarl. “Yep, and she’s loaded! Keep it around to kill snakes, Benton. Your rattles’d look plumb handsome on the end of my watch chain. Don’t get to coilin’ where I can see you. While Bill Bronc’s in my house he’s under my care—you understand? If any man crosses this threshold, I'll kill him. And you can cut out your whoopin’ and hollerin’. I like it quiet when: I’m working.” Silence came after the door slammed and the lock scraped. But Bill knew they were still out there, stewing in the juice of their hatred. So for another thirty minutes Doc worked with all the tools he possessed. His set features revealed nothing. Finally he bound Jeanie’s head with gauze and called Scotty and Paso and Bill. “She'll have to stay here. Give me a hand with the table.” Using it as a stretcher, they carried her into a rear bedroom and Ma Breaker came with a clean white nightgown. She shooed the men out of the room. In the narrow, dim-lit hallway, the doctor faced them. “It doesn’t look good, Scotty. All we can do is wait.” Scotty nodded, dumbly resigned now, no words coming to express his grief. “How long, Doc?” Bill’s voice sounded a mile away to him. “Twelve hours... I don’t know.” : From the shadows, Barney Sloane drawled: “What do you care, _Brone? You won’t be around.” “Cut that out, Sloane!’ Doc’s eyes swerved. Sloane blew a cloud of smoke between them. Intense distaste deepened the brackets at the sides of Breaker’s lips. After a moment he turned to the silent Rafter H owner. ° “My sympathy is all with you, Scotty. But let’s get this one little angle out where it'll show. You’re as much to. blame for what’s happened as Bill Bronce. You could have let these youngsters marry and pull out of a war they never started. It’s you and Hass Colley—and our friend Sloane, here—who’ve fired the big guns in this battle. It’s not fair to blame Bill.” To Bill, the frigid reception of his plea was no surprise. Doc found no response of any kind on Hallett’s bearded face. His gaze swivelled to Paso Anson, and that loyal ramrod was as Indian-faced as ever. The silence tightened, then finally Scotty stirred. “We'll go out the back way,’ mured. He moved off, his broad dpiuttiers blocking the hall. Barney Sloane knocked twenty-four hours. * he mur- the ash from his cigar and fell in behind © them. At the door, Scotty stood stiffly, looking back at Bill. “Comin’?” : (EOLPMIELOOOL KS (E©)